Tuesday – June 20, 2006 – Day Eight

Is it over yet?

Just thought I'd ask. Good morning from Columbus! The weather is wonderful – 72 degrees, going to a high of 79.

The mood today seems to be almost anticlimactic among those who are more orthodox. There is one day left, and not much to look forward to here. Most of us believe that there will be a whole lot to look forward to in the coming months!

The Nationwide Catastrophe Response Unit appeared this morning. To quote Richard Crocker, "Quite the coincidence!"

Worship this morning was wonderful!

Our songs included All hail the power of Jesus Name, In the cross of Christ I glory, When I survey the wondrous Cross, and Lift high the cross.  
The Epistle lesson today? 1 Corinthians 1:18-24.  
Bishop Iker celebrated and Dean Robert Munday of Nashotah house delivered a fine sermon on the centrality of the cross.  Oh, and in case you were wondering, we used Rite I, sung, with incense and bells.
Father Dow Sanderson would have approved. Glowingly.

10:55 – Gaveled in for our 10:45 meeting.  The mood is apparently anxious for the revisionists. The President said we were all anxious this morning. I’m not. Kendall is up and pacing the house, but he is not anxious. He's Kendall, and that's what Kendall does.

A procedural motion was offered to do away with speeches, introductions, etc. so that we can get on with legislating our resolutions. It passed.

As a special order we are going to take up Canon Barry Beisner’s consecration first thing. (D038)

No – we are not!  Byron Rushing of New York made a motion to wait until we finished debate on A161, because it was germane to Beisner’s election – “manner of life.” 

We voted to postpone D038, and go back to work on A-161.

Right off the bat, Fr. Christopher Cantrell of Fort Worth offered a substitute amendment. His amendment returned A-161 to actual Windsor Report language. Here it is:

Resolved, the house of ___ concurring, That the 75th General Convention of the Episcopal Church “effect a moratorium on the election and consent to the consecration of any candidate to the episcopate who is living in a same gender union until [and unless] some new consensus in the Anglican Communion emerges” (WR134) and be it further

Resolved that the 75th GC effect a moratorium on the authorizing of all public rites of blessing of same sex unions (WR 144), and be it further

Resolved that the 75th GC call upon those bishops who have authorized public rites for blessing same sex unions, “because of the serious repercussions in the Communion…to express regret that the proper constraints of the bonds of affection were breached by such authorization” (WR144)

The other side went nuts! Nuts!  It was amazing to watch, and I wish you could have been there! The other side tried to kill it before it could be offered. Before Fr. Cantrell could speak and explain what the motion was, the other side was screaming points of order. Three times Fr. Cantrell started to explain and three times he was shouted down by different points of order!

The third point stuck. The other side decided to challenge the ruling of the chair that said that this substitute could be offered. We had to vote to allow the chairs ruling to stand before Fr. Cantrel could even speak. So we voted.

Yes 541.
No, 283
Sorry boys and girls, the chair’s ruling stands.

After the substitute motion was offered,  the debate came on, hot and heavy. The revisionists were in a pure-tee panic. They lost all semblance of composure.

Debate Masters like Don Currin of Central Florida spoke in favor.
                                                                                                              (Don at lunch)

Fr. Currin had one of the best lines of the day! The Central Florida delegation has Newark right behind them. Louie Crew is the head delegate from Newark, and the behind-the scenes head of the whole Episcopal gay movement. So Don says, "We are seated in front of Newark and I have really enjoyed getting to know 'the Crew'." Don went on to rightly point out that we have two entirely different churches trying to share the same roof, and this substitute amendment would clarify the direction this church would be heading in the future.

To that, Jim Bradbury of Connecticut said kill this substitute! Let’s consider the original, because after all, it was crafted by all sides. (What Bradbury didn't say is that his delegation was also against the original - they voted against the original when it came to the floor.)

There was a vote on extending the time for debate. It lost. A request for a ruling of constitutionality was made. The speaker  said that this convention can’t pass this resolution, because the word "effect" is in it, and to "effect" something would requite a constitutional change. The exchanges on both sides got heated. The other side was in a p-a-n-i-c!

We went to noonday prayers. The chaplain couldn’t find the page number in the prayer book for noonday prayer.

While we were trying to do the liturgy, the screens kept flashing on and off.

The chaplain kept missing words in his prepared meditation.

Anslem is on the move!!

After the noonday prayers, the results of constitutionality were announced. The committee ruled the first resolve was unconstitutional, and the other two resolves were ok. 

The ruling that the other two resolves were OK was challenged.  Kendall also challenged the first resolve.  We threw this back and forth and finally the President decide to let us go to lunch early if we would agree to come back early. We did.

This was such fun! We all knew that there was no way we could win, but we were clarifying. We turned on the lights and the roaches started running!

Kendall helped lead discussion at the AAC luncheon. Said K (not an actual quote by any means), "...part of what’s going on is that there is a chasm that separates two very different world views and you cannot bridge a chasm with the kind of legislative design that we have.  The special commission simple couldn’t deal with it.. It’s not an accident we are floundering in the house."

Bishop Iker spoke:  It is clear we are becoming a church that honors Gnosticism and new-age spiritualism. He is clearly correct. He also pointed out, The house of bishops doesn’t have a clue as to what a “wholesome example” is.

On the way back from lunch, I'm beginning to notice a whole lot of construction that hadn't been there in days past.

Hmmm. Is the bloom off the Columbus rose?

Might be.

2:04 - Gaveled in for our 2:00 meeting. We returned to debate on A161. Surely enough, the substitute amendment was indeed rejected as being out of order, because constitutional changes would be necessary to effect a change.  

Kendall appealed the ruling, saying that whenever a community wants to do something, they can if they have the will to.

We didn't the appeal lost. Big time. The rule of the chair stands.

2:15 – Began a vote by orders on the main resolution – A161.
3:00 – the votes were announced – after a prayer from the chaplain.

It was a vote by orders, requiring it to pass in both the lay and the clergy orders.
Lay - 109 delegations voting:
Yes 38
No 53
Divided 18
TOTAL Yes, 38
TOTAL No, 71

Clergy - 111 delegations voting:
Yes 44
No 53
Divided 14
TOTAL Yes, 44
TOTAL No, 77

A161 - the entire centerpiece of the response to the Windsor Report - has been rejected.

After this, we took a 20-minute break. Kendall was swamped by reporters.  Isn't this impressive?

I thought so.

Before we returned from the break, another wave of reporters asked for interviews. Kendall obliged, and on one of the videos, I ended up being in the background. I knew we were being filmed, so I tried to be discrete. I wasn't going to point this out but I see that Holy Cross' Les Allred has already let his 5 thousand member email list know, so here you go - Click HERE to watch a great Kendall interview.

When we returned, we took up the confirmation of Bary Beisner to be the next bishop of Northern California – and we voted to confirm. Kendall spoke on the matter, noting that because of his three marriages, the Rev. Mr. Beisner would be unable serve as a priest in our diocese, much less be able to serve as a bishop. The House was not impressed...

Here's the Northern California delegation welcoming their new bishop:

There was a motion made to reconsider A161 as originally presented in the blue book - The motion did not pass. 

We then went to other stuff - a l-o-t of other stuff.

Before we broke for supper we took up D058 – "Salvation through Christ alone" – the Evangelism Committee had previously recommended the motion to be discharged, saying that it had already been dealt with in previous resolutions at previous conventions. We gave a valiant fight to try and get the resolution considered, but lost in a 70/30 vote. It was discharged. I wouldn't go so far as to say that the House was against what the resolution said, but they didn't want to bring it up for debate. To use the words President Werner used for a previous defeated motion, "It's whacked!"  

We broke for Supper, and came back at 7:00 p.m. to start again.

7:03 - We begin our evening session, by figuring out what we will do (passing special orders to deal with particular important pieces of legislation out of the normal order of when they would be coming up.  We decide to work on A-159, A166, and A082. A-159 and A-166 are Windsor-compliant resolutions 

We discuss how long we will debate, how long we will do amendments and so on and so forth.  Let me tell you, this was tedious.

Bobby and Lonnie both agree.

Finally, 58 minutes later, we begin debate on A159. Someone makes an amendment that takes out the “interdependence.” She said she believes strongly in commitment to working with the rest of Anglican Communion in any way we can, but not as an interdependent member.  Here we go again – autonomy, not Communion.

The amendment fails. We end up voting FOR 159, and the vote was just about unanimous.   That took 21 minutes. Not bad.  

8:20 - We move to A166.

Someone suggest that A166 would be signing a blank check, and we ought not to be that trusting. Kendall spoke to it, and used a marriage analogy. He said that when he and his wife got married, neither of them had any idea how things would turn out. The made the promise to each other, God honored it. Our God is a God that honors promises. Thus, said Kendall, make the commitment.

The next speaker after Kendall argued against the covenant language. He said we need to keep our uniqueness. Get this; this is an exact quote: 

Only those who live in a context have a right to define it.  

Is that clear enough for you as to where the other side lives?  Kendall spoke in terms of marriage, the speaker who followed him spoke in terms of shacking up.

And right after that jewel of wisdom, an amendment was offered – The words “Covenant” in the resolution should be replaced by the word “conversation.”   I don't believe it!  Mercy!!! 

Blessedly, this stupid amendment was soundly defeated. Ok. It’s getting late. Strike the word stupid, and the jury is instructed to ignore the remark.

8:46 p.m. – voted FOR 166.

We then moved to A082, which is about amending the ordination canons. There’s not a lot to say about this, but we found a lot to say. Looks like we ought to be able to sign off on it.  

We did – we adjourned at 9:22.

It was a wild day today. From jubilation this morning at the confusion generated over the substitute to A161 to the sheer exhaustion caused by considering so many resolutions and losing on so many of them. The original intent of our delegation was to shine the light of Christ and clarify and lose gracefully. But I have never liked to lose. 

I have to keep reminding myself that this is not my battle. This battle belongs to the Lord. He will win it. We prayed for clarity, and boy-oh-boy, we got it. By voting the way this House has decided to vote today on so many resolutions, they have indeed clarified themselves. The other House, the House of bishops concurs. We really do have two religions trying to exist under one roof. We are a house divided against itself. Jesus is quite clear about the ramifications of such a design.

In your emails to me I’ve had a lot of questions concerning our future – questions like, “What does this Convention’s actions mean for our future?”  I won't begin to answer that by myself, because I am part of a diocese – The Diocese of South Carolina.  I have ideas, and I will share them with our bishop and our Standing Committee. But I trust our leadership to guard the faith given to us, and I am not at all worried about the future of our diocese.  I know that a whole lot of behind-the-scenes work has already been done, in anticipation of the very Convention we've had. I know what Windsor needed, and I know that we have not given it to them. I know what some Archbishops are already saying. God is working out his plan. This is not the time to try to fight a political battle. "The LORD will fight for you; you need only to be still."

I am the rector of two wonderful churches (Holy Cross and St. Peter and St. John) and I can indeed say that they are people of prayer and people of conviction. Our two congregations along with the 70 other parishes and missions in our diocesan family, create a strong and united witness for our Lord. South Carolina is a strong and seaworthy ship on which to sail these uncharted waters. I pray that we will remain united in our efforts and stay on our knees in humble submission to Jesus Christ. If we remain united in our efforts and let God fight the battle ahead, we will arrive safely on the other side. I, for one, am praying for God to effect His plan. I know his plan for my parishes for my diocese.

"For I know the plans I have for you," declares the Lord, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. (Jeremiah 29:11-13)

If ever there were a time for the diocesan clergy to stick together, that time has come. If ever there were a time for the parishes and missions to unite in a common effort, the time is now.  God is preparing us for what he has prepared for us.

Well. It's 2:25 a.m. I have to pack. We leave tomorrow. Is it over yet?   Please?

Good night from Columbus!